1852, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Oiwake: Oiwa and Takuetsu -- National Museum of Asian Art (Washington)
From the museum label: The Kisokaidō road was one of the five main highways that traversed Japan in the Edo period (1603-1868), connecting Edo and Kyoto via a mountainous inland route. As domestic tourism developed over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the stations along the road became associated with different views and local goods particular to that area. For this series, Utagawa Kuniyoshi was commissioned to produce designs to match each of the stations, creating images whose subjects are often clever puns on the place names. Here, Kuniyoshi has paired the famous "hair-combing" scene from Ghost Story of Yotsuya on the Tōkaidō with the station Oiwake, located in Nagano prefecture. The literal meaning of "Oiwake" is "forked road," but the same sounds can also mean "Oiwa's hair" (Oiwa-ke).
1852, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Oiwake: Oiwa and Takuetsu -- National Museum of Asian Art (Washington)
From the museum label: The Kisokaidō road was one of the five main highways that traversed Japan in the Edo period (1603-1868), connecting Edo and Kyoto via a mountainous inland route. As domestic tourism developed over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the stations along the road became associated with different views and local goods particular to that area. For this series, Utagawa Kuniyoshi was commissioned to produce designs to match each of the stations, creating images whose subjects are often clever puns on the place names. Here, Kuniyoshi has paired the famous "hair-combing" scene from Ghost Story of Yotsuya on the Tōkaidō with the station Oiwake, located in Nagano prefecture. The literal meaning of "Oiwake" is "forked road," but the same sounds can also mean "Oiwa's hair" (Oiwa-ke).